Last Month, in Japan, Venture Capitalist deedy das was supposed to be off the grid, Focus solely on proping to his girlfriend. Two nights into the Trip, The Deal Flow Found Him Anyway.
A founder he’d been getting to know over the eight months texted to say he was kicking off a raise. Other investors were circling, but the founder wanted das and his firm, menlo Ventures, at the table. So Between Temple Visits and Kaisieki Meals – and Once we did he told his girlfriend he was soaking at the onsen – das coordinate with Colleagues Back Home.
The day after he retourned to California, the Founder Pitched Menlo’s Partners. That evening, das – newly engaged – and the founder celebrated a handshake aggrement over japanese at ozumo.
Inly a year and a half working in venture, das has quickly Become one to watch. He joined meneno after stints as an Engineer at Facebook and Google, and as an Early Employe at the Enterprise Search Company Glean, where he helped scale the bushing no product to a $ 2.2 Billion valuation. In june, that figure jumped to $ 7.2 billion.
At Menlo, He’s Carved Out a Role at the Cutting Edge of Artificial Intelligence, Infrastructure, and Enterprise Software Investing. He helped Launch the firm’s $ 100 million Anthology Fund, A Joint Venture with Anthropic, and Earned A Reputation for His Unusage Technical Diligence. Now, with his promotion to partner, das is part of a new generation climate Capital’s Ranks.
Deedy Das and Anthropic Cofounder Ben Mann Talk Onstage at an event hosted by menlo ventures. Menlo Ventures
Increasingly, firms are looking to leaders who come from the trums of Engineering and Startups, swimming the Spreadsheet Jockes Groomed in Banking. In Today’s Market, Where Breakthroughs Come Wrapped in Jargon and White Papers, Technical Fluency Isn’t a nice-to-have. It ‘prectically the nonb description.
Menlo is Bulking Up Its Roster With Investors Who Bring Technical Bona Fides. This year, it hied cybersecurity guru matt kraning, who sold his startup to palo alto networks in a deal topping $ 1 billion.
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Tim Tully, A General Partner and Splunk’s Form Chief Tech Office, Previously Told Business Insider, Founders “Want Investors Who They Can Talk Shop with.”
Inside track
Deep Learning and Natural Language Processing Have Always Been Central to Glean’s Products. But as models Advanced gradually, then all at once, ceo arvind jain assembled a dedicated “Tiger Team” of Engineers to Fold the Latest Capabilities into the platform.
DAS LED that EFFORT, Steering the Company Beyond Its Original Googinal-like Search Interface into something Digests Date, Interprets, and Can Perform Task on A USER’S Behalf. TODAY, The Company is on Pace to hit $ 250 million in annualized revenue by the end of the year, up from $ 100 million in 2024.
Jain Says the Systems and Products that das, Who Left Glean in 2024, Helped Create Are “Still Central to How Our Customers use glean.”
“I’ve know deedy for many years,” Jain Said, “his impact at glean was significant as a founding Engineer – from shaping out and raising the bar Excellence to mentoring teammates and helping the culture. scale. ”
A discerning deedy das checks out a product demo at an event meslo ventures hosted in partnership with anthropic. Menlo Ventures
Das Says HIS Background Gave Him an Early Read on Openrouter, Which Offers Developers a single platform to Access Multiple Large Language Models. HAVING BUILT A VERSION OF THE SAME TOOL AT GLEAN, IT KNEW The Demand Wauld Be Real.
Be he met founder alex atAllah, das didn’t hedge: “This is absolutely going to be useful. Model velocity is not going to stop. Wenever you ready to raise, we’re in.” He laughs now, knowing that he didn’t have the autoritity to promise that deal, but was willing to bluff. MENLO FIRST BACKED The startup with a modest check Through the anthology end before Double to Lead the $ 40 million Series A in June.
Over the past year, das says openrouter ha scaled from processing About 10 trillion tokens annually to be 250 trillion – a 25x jump in throughput. ITS Business Model Ties Revenue Directly to Usage, That Surge Suggests Revenue Has Grown in Lockstep.
Das’s Other Investments Include WISP Flow, an App that Turs Mesy Speech Into polished Writing, and Goodfire, a Research Lab Focused on Undersanding Why Machine Learning Behave The Way they will. Both came in through the anthology end before meninged on with more capital. These deals and others earned das a spot on the Business Insider’s 2024 List of the Rising Stars of the Venture Capital Industry.
“Deedy is someone who has convicts in bold ideas where oters may be skeptical,” Says Goodfire Ceo Eric Ho. “Has an ability to see the futures in a way.”
Members of the Menlo Ventures Team Laugh Together. Menlo Ventures
The Same Technical Rigor That Helps Das Land Deals Also Cuts Through Hype.
A Few Months Ago, das looked at a pitch from a buzzy startup raising a round and th nough it Cohort retenttion, a Measure of Product Stickies, LOOKED Too good. He was right. AFTER PULLING AN EXCE FILE The Company’s Data Room, and Ran the Numbers Through Claude Code to Re-Graph the Curve. He realized the startup haad Juiced the math to make retention look Stronger than it was.
BETWEEN SOURCING DEALS AND READING WHITE PAPERS, DAS ALSO Leans on it to Boost His Own Productivity. He use WISP to Send Texts and Clear His Inbox Faster. With Claude, he vibe-coded a news aggregator that pulls updates from his preferers. He’s the budilt One Agent to Research People on his Calendar, and another that scrapes linkedin to find out who’s starting companies.
“It ‘s kind of Strange,” Das Laughs. “We invest in the cutting Edge, but the Venture firms don’t use any cutting-edge technology to do Actual Work.”
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